Grading workflow is poor - how do I reduce my clicks?

I have students who turn in a host of assignments inconsistently. Meaning I may have 2 of one assignment turned in, three of another, and 10 of a third. There are huge swathes of nothing turned in in some parts of the grade book (this is fine). So my grading workflow is I go to the Home Page, see what is in my to do box, click on the first assignment, grade themin Speedgrader. But then I have to click "exit to gradebook" then "home" to see the to do list again. In speedgreader this there a way to jump to the next piece of work that is turned in?

Kristen, there isn't a way to go to the next assignment that has things that need grading, but two things you might try.

1. On the course home page when you go to click the assignment name from the To Do list, right click on it and open it in a new tab. That way when you're done grading one assignment you can close that tab and be right back on the course home page to click on the next assignment. Along those same lines you can open all the assignments that need grading doing this (right click and open in a new tab) and then each one will be in their own tab at the top of the screen and you can work your way through them.

2. Something else you can do is from Speedgrader click on the name of your class; it's right after the due date and time. It doesn't look like it, but that's a clickable link that takes you back to your course home page.

First, you can set SpeedGrader to display based on "Submission Status". This means that it will display submissions needing grading first, and place the "no submission after. Learn more at How do I sort the student list in SpeedGrader? That's always good for a few clicks.

Second, there is not need to go to the Gradebook, after grading one assignment in SpeedGrader. You can go straight to your course Home page and click on the next assignment by simply clicking on the title of your course while in SpeedGrader.

In addition to the feedback that both Kona Jones and Kelley L. Meeusen have given you, I wonder if this Feature Idea, Ability to move through all assignments for one student in speedgrader, is at all similar to what you're trying to accomplish? If so, you might want to consider voting for it and adding your feedback. As you can see, this Feature Idea is on Instructure's "Product Radar" stage, and that means that they are aware of the need, but they may not be able to implement such a feature in the near future. (Use the link I've provided to read more about that stage.)